I am fine today :-) Just continue to share my story...
I know this is not a dream, so I have to accept the reality first and then face the challenge. Anyway, life is not a bed of roses, no matter what races you are and what religion you belief. If you belief that Christian should always be healthy, trouble-free and millionaire, read the book of Job in the Bible carefully. This is a very important concept we need to grasp first so that we would be able to accept the reality of suffering and then to face the challenge with God's guidance. Else we would end up to be a miserable man, unable to accept the reality and thus unable to face the challenge.
I am a Christian who trust God and put all my hope in God. I did not respond this life crisis with tears and complaint. And I don't need to question God why this unfortunate even happen to me. What I need to know is that He will guide me through this crisis, no matter what the outcome would be. This promise is recorded in the Bible, “Putting all your troubles on him, for he takes care of you.” I Peter 5:7.
I have faith in God and this faith does not look at the outcome of the disease only, but look at the hand of God. When I fully convinced He will guide me through this ordeal, the outcome of this ordeal becomes a secondary matter. In other word, whether I am cured or not is not so important now. The important thing is that He is holding my hand or even carrying me through my problem.
However, this does not mean that we do not need to pray for a cure, the Bible teach us also to put our requests before God and he will grant us peace of God, which is deeper than all knowledge. “Have no cares, but in everything with prayer and praise put your requests before God. And the peace of God, which is deeper than all knowledge, will keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.” Philips 4:6-7.
The following hymn which I memorize depicts the above belief strongly. The English version can be difficult to understand, I present a Chinese version as well.
He leadeth me! O blessed thought
1. He leadeth me! O blessed thought, O words with heav'nly comfort fraught;
Whate'er I do, where'er I be, Still 'tis Christ's hand that leadeth me.
Chorus:
He leadeth me! He leadeth me! By His own hand He leadeth me;
His faithful follower I would be, For by His hand He leadeth me.
2. Sometimes 'mid scenes of deepest gloom, Sometimes where Eden's bowers bloom,
By waters still, o'er troubled sea, Still 'tis His hand that leadeth me. (to Chorus)
3. Lord, I would clasp Thy hand in mine, Nor ever murmur or repine;
Content, whatever lot I see, Since it is Thou that leadest me. (to Chorus)
4. And when my task on earth is done, When, by Thy grace, the vict'ry's won,
E'en death's cold wave I will not flee, Since Thou in triumph leadest me. (to Chorus)
耶稣领我歌
1. 耶稣领我 我真喜欢 蒙主引导 心中平安
无论日夜 动静起坐 耶稣圣手时常领我
副歌：
耶稣领我 耶稣领我 耶稣天天亲手领我
我愿为主忠实信徒 因蒙主恩时常领我
2. 有时遭遇困苦忧伤 有时大得喜乐安康
无论危险 无论稳妥 全靠耶稣亲手领我（副歌）
3. 我愿紧握恩主圣手 甘心乐意随主行走
遇祸遇福 两般皆可 因有耶稣亲手领我（副歌）
4. 到时行完一世路程 靠托主恩完全得胜
死亡冷河我不怕过 因有耶稣亲手领我（副歌）
See you next post :-)
Showing posts with label Diagnosis. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Diagnosis. Show all posts
Sunday, August 27, 2006
Day +52
I am fine today.
I never thought that I would be so “lucky” to have this AML, a disease which seems so strange to me, but suddenly is inside me. I never buy lottery or 4D throughout my life, but I did participate in many lucky draw and competition which require luck to win. Apart from winning a second prize lucky draw which consists of air tickets for two persons from Miri to Mulu National Park more than 10 years ago, I never win any other prizes. In fact, the chance of getting AML is quite small, it may be as little as a few persons among 100,000. So getting this disease is just like winning a 2 million ringgit first prize TOTO 6/42 jackpot without even putting a bet on it.
How I wish this is just a bad dream where I could just settle every problem in the dream, no matter how critical it is, by waking up from the dream. I believe everyone experience some bad dream occasionally. A dream such as forgot to prepare for exam, lost in the jungle, family member kidnapped or falling down from very high altitudes. When we wake up, we would say to ourselves, "What a relief, it is just a dream." Then we don't have to be troubled by whatever problem in the dream, unless we are looking for trouble.
See you next post:-)
I never thought that I would be so “lucky” to have this AML, a disease which seems so strange to me, but suddenly is inside me. I never buy lottery or 4D throughout my life, but I did participate in many lucky draw and competition which require luck to win. Apart from winning a second prize lucky draw which consists of air tickets for two persons from Miri to Mulu National Park more than 10 years ago, I never win any other prizes. In fact, the chance of getting AML is quite small, it may be as little as a few persons among 100,000. So getting this disease is just like winning a 2 million ringgit first prize TOTO 6/42 jackpot without even putting a bet on it.
How I wish this is just a bad dream where I could just settle every problem in the dream, no matter how critical it is, by waking up from the dream. I believe everyone experience some bad dream occasionally. A dream such as forgot to prepare for exam, lost in the jungle, family member kidnapped or falling down from very high altitudes. When we wake up, we would say to ourselves, "What a relief, it is just a dream." Then we don't have to be troubled by whatever problem in the dream, unless we are looking for trouble.
See you next post:-)
Wednesday, August 23, 2006
Day +48
I am fine today. I would like to continue my story...
The arrival of Pastor and my youngest brother helped me and my sister a lot. They helped to take care of me, pray for me and participated in many decisions related to my treatment. My wife was about 5 months pregnant at that time, so it was not convenient for her to stay in the hospital to take care of me. At that time many Christians in many churches started to support me through prayer.
The result of BMA was out on the 30, November 2005. The doctor told me that I had Acute Myeloid Leukaemia (AML), subtype M4. The French-American-British (FAB) classification divides AML into 8 subtypes, from M0 to M7. The doctor also said that my type of Leukaemia is easier to cure. She then explained to me how they were going to treat me and the risk involved in the treatment.
When I got my blood report on the 28 November, I know my family and I were going to face another crisis. I had been through many crises in life, mostly related to my family members, but this time it directly involved me and the BMA result again confirmed this.
The first reaction came to everyone mind was, “Why I get this disease?” The doctor said we know very little about the cause of Leukaemia apart from exposure to radioactive radiation and certain chemical such as benzene. No one was satisfied with this answer, so everyone started to speculate how this disease developed.
“It must be your diet…” to them all diseases are due to food.
“It must be the computer…” because I worked in front of computer 10 hours a day.
“It must be the handpone…” they suspected electromagnetic field is the culprit.
“It must be you work so hard…” because I worked harder than most of the staff.
“It must be a trial from God…” some Christian said.
“It must be you lack of exercise…” those who believed the body would secrete toxin through sweating.
“It must be due to accumulation of toxin in your body” those who believed some form of detoxification can prevent or cure all diseases.
“It must be due to too much stress…” someone said.
“It must be…”
Suddenly I was surrounded by a group of experts who knew the causes of the Leukaemia better than anyone else. I started to wonder how they could be more expert than the doctors and specialist. The first reason is the establishment of a lot of Multilevel Marketing (MLM) companies that sell “magic products” that claimed to kill all birds with one stone. The best strategy to sell the products is to tell you that you body accumulated too much toxins, it is too dangerous if you don't detoxify your body with their products. Driven by the dream of becoming financial independency within a short period of time and the promise of enjoying continuous effortless income for the generations to come, the MLM agents will penetrate every level of societies with the concept of body toxification and the necessity of detoxification. The 2nd reason is due to some very good public speakers who advocate natural therapy or alternative medicine, who always find their way into mass media to propagate their ideas. The public, including me when I first get exposed to this alternative medicine, would then take everything they speak as truth because they can speak very well and their points seem to be very reasonable.
Someone even advised me to abandon this conventional treatment and to go for alternative treatment because they heard someone get healed with this alternative treatment. I felt that it is too risky to go for alternative treatment just based on some isolated cases. So I asked for statistics such as percentage of a cure of AML with any form of alternative treatment, but no one could provide it to me. So I concluded it is more risky to go for alternative treatment than conventional treatment.
One thing I need to clarify is that I am not in anyway against the concept of natural therapy or alternative medicine, and also whatever products. I believe many of the concepts are very helpful to maintain a healthy living. But we also cannot take everything that they advocate as absolutely true as most of them claimed. If you start to read more and analyze carefully, your will soon find many contractions among them and many claims are based on very weak reasoning.
As a patient who is just diagnosed with cancer and struggling to accept the reality, expert ideas like these do not in any mean help him/her. It only brings more confusion to him/her. I believe I am not the only one who encountered this. Most of the patients should also experience this.
See you next post:-)
The arrival of Pastor and my youngest brother helped me and my sister a lot. They helped to take care of me, pray for me and participated in many decisions related to my treatment. My wife was about 5 months pregnant at that time, so it was not convenient for her to stay in the hospital to take care of me. At that time many Christians in many churches started to support me through prayer.
The result of BMA was out on the 30, November 2005. The doctor told me that I had Acute Myeloid Leukaemia (AML), subtype M4. The French-American-British (FAB) classification divides AML into 8 subtypes, from M0 to M7. The doctor also said that my type of Leukaemia is easier to cure. She then explained to me how they were going to treat me and the risk involved in the treatment.
When I got my blood report on the 28 November, I know my family and I were going to face another crisis. I had been through many crises in life, mostly related to my family members, but this time it directly involved me and the BMA result again confirmed this.
The first reaction came to everyone mind was, “Why I get this disease?” The doctor said we know very little about the cause of Leukaemia apart from exposure to radioactive radiation and certain chemical such as benzene. No one was satisfied with this answer, so everyone started to speculate how this disease developed.
“It must be your diet…” to them all diseases are due to food.
“It must be the computer…” because I worked in front of computer 10 hours a day.
“It must be the handpone…” they suspected electromagnetic field is the culprit.
“It must be you work so hard…” because I worked harder than most of the staff.
“It must be a trial from God…” some Christian said.
“It must be you lack of exercise…” those who believed the body would secrete toxin through sweating.
“It must be due to accumulation of toxin in your body” those who believed some form of detoxification can prevent or cure all diseases.
“It must be due to too much stress…” someone said.
“It must be…”
Suddenly I was surrounded by a group of experts who knew the causes of the Leukaemia better than anyone else. I started to wonder how they could be more expert than the doctors and specialist. The first reason is the establishment of a lot of Multilevel Marketing (MLM) companies that sell “magic products” that claimed to kill all birds with one stone. The best strategy to sell the products is to tell you that you body accumulated too much toxins, it is too dangerous if you don't detoxify your body with their products. Driven by the dream of becoming financial independency within a short period of time and the promise of enjoying continuous effortless income for the generations to come, the MLM agents will penetrate every level of societies with the concept of body toxification and the necessity of detoxification. The 2nd reason is due to some very good public speakers who advocate natural therapy or alternative medicine, who always find their way into mass media to propagate their ideas. The public, including me when I first get exposed to this alternative medicine, would then take everything they speak as truth because they can speak very well and their points seem to be very reasonable.
Someone even advised me to abandon this conventional treatment and to go for alternative treatment because they heard someone get healed with this alternative treatment. I felt that it is too risky to go for alternative treatment just based on some isolated cases. So I asked for statistics such as percentage of a cure of AML with any form of alternative treatment, but no one could provide it to me. So I concluded it is more risky to go for alternative treatment than conventional treatment.
One thing I need to clarify is that I am not in anyway against the concept of natural therapy or alternative medicine, and also whatever products. I believe many of the concepts are very helpful to maintain a healthy living. But we also cannot take everything that they advocate as absolutely true as most of them claimed. If you start to read more and analyze carefully, your will soon find many contractions among them and many claims are based on very weak reasoning.
As a patient who is just diagnosed with cancer and struggling to accept the reality, expert ideas like these do not in any mean help him/her. It only brings more confusion to him/her. I believe I am not the only one who encountered this. Most of the patients should also experience this.
See you next post:-)
Sunday, August 20, 2006
Day +46
I am well today. I would like to continue my story :-)
After knowing I was admitted to SGH, my sister came back from Bintulu to Kuching on the next available flight, without attending the wedding banquet. She supposed to go sightseeing there for a few more days.
The doctor who examined me in the emergency ward asked me a lot of questions. All questions were related to my lifestyle and my family background. He then admitted me to the general ward. A "RIB"(Rest in Bed) sign was hung on my bed and I was advised not to leave my bed.
My brother-in-law who sent me to the hospital went home after he handled the admission procedure for me and I settled down in the ward. At 10:00pm, I felt I would like to pass urine. But I was not allowed to leave the bed, and I could not find the urine container underneath the bed either. Coincidently there was no nurse around at that time, so I tried to call the nurse, but unfortunately there was no nurse call system available. I really didn't know what to do.
Suddenly, my eldest sister appeared and I was so relieved. I thank God to bring her in just at the right time to help me, else I have to "tahan"(endure) don't know for how long.
On the night, I was also given platelet transfusion. After the transfusion, the urine was cleared of blood and my taste also restored. Before that, the water that I drank had a very funny taste.
The doctor told me that they were going to do a bone marrow aspiration (BMA) for me as soon as possible to determine the exact type of blood disease that I had. When I heard this, I was quite scared because I heard from my 2nd brother that this BMA is really painful. He was diagnosed with bacterial meningitis and was under very serious condition more than 10 years ago. We, together with many other Christians prayed for him very hard and eventually he was completely healed of the disease. Later I realized that he was actually having spinal fluid extraction, not BMA.
I did my first BMA on the morning of 29, November. The doctor put me to sleep first before doing the BMA, so it was not as painfully as I expected.
After I waked up, I saw my youngest brother together with my pastor at my bed side. They just arrived from Puchong to visit me.
See you next post"-)
After knowing I was admitted to SGH, my sister came back from Bintulu to Kuching on the next available flight, without attending the wedding banquet. She supposed to go sightseeing there for a few more days.
The doctor who examined me in the emergency ward asked me a lot of questions. All questions were related to my lifestyle and my family background. He then admitted me to the general ward. A "RIB"(Rest in Bed) sign was hung on my bed and I was advised not to leave my bed.
My brother-in-law who sent me to the hospital went home after he handled the admission procedure for me and I settled down in the ward. At 10:00pm, I felt I would like to pass urine. But I was not allowed to leave the bed, and I could not find the urine container underneath the bed either. Coincidently there was no nurse around at that time, so I tried to call the nurse, but unfortunately there was no nurse call system available. I really didn't know what to do.
Suddenly, my eldest sister appeared and I was so relieved. I thank God to bring her in just at the right time to help me, else I have to "tahan"(endure) don't know for how long.
On the night, I was also given platelet transfusion. After the transfusion, the urine was cleared of blood and my taste also restored. Before that, the water that I drank had a very funny taste.
The doctor told me that they were going to do a bone marrow aspiration (BMA) for me as soon as possible to determine the exact type of blood disease that I had. When I heard this, I was quite scared because I heard from my 2nd brother that this BMA is really painful. He was diagnosed with bacterial meningitis and was under very serious condition more than 10 years ago. We, together with many other Christians prayed for him very hard and eventually he was completely healed of the disease. Later I realized that he was actually having spinal fluid extraction, not BMA.
I did my first BMA on the morning of 29, November. The doctor put me to sleep first before doing the BMA, so it was not as painfully as I expected.
After I waked up, I saw my youngest brother together with my pastor at my bed side. They just arrived from Puchong to visit me.
See you next post"-)
Saturday, August 19, 2006
Day +45
I am fine today. My wife make some every nice steam bun today with tuna, long beam and peanut filling. I have them for dinner and they are really delicious.
The diagnosis of this disease was not very straight forward. The first symptom appeared as rashes on the arms and legs early November last year. Because I just enjoyed seafood with some of our church members and our visitors from Hong Kong, I thought the rashes might be due to seafood allergy. In fact, this was my ignorant as I had no history of seafood allergy before. Furthermore the rashes were not raised and not itchy at all. It was actually due to bleeding under the skin because of low platelet, a condition called petechiae.
Other than the rashes, my health looked normal. I still went for jogging very morning and worked very hard. As my family and I prepared to go back to Sarawak for holiday, my company’s software development source code management system went completely haywire. In order to fix the problem, I worked 3 days overnight until the morning of 15 November, the day we traveled back to Bintangor.
We visited my 2nd sister in Sibu, my wife family in Sarikei, my 3rd sister (stem cell donor) which is not far from my mother house and many other relatives. Most of the time we stayed at my elder brothers house in a kampung”(Village) called Sungei Mador, the house where all my family members stayed before we have our own family. It is somewhere between Sibu and Sarikei. The children enjoyed kampung life very much. They managed to play with the dog and rabbits, chased the chickens and ducks, went for fishing, played sand, visited pepper and orange farms and experienced many other new thing.
After one week staying in the kampung, on the day we would like to fly to Kuching, I developed sore throat with blood in the phlegm. My wife and I went to see a doctor in Sarikei. This doctor speaks Foochow and called, “Ah Kiew, Ah Kiew, come.” He called me like my wife or my family member called me. After examining my throat, he said, “You have acute throat inflammation. Why you come so late?” But I did not experience any pain as when I had acute throat inflammation before. He asked me to swallow an antibiotic tablet in the clinic immediately and prescribed a 5 days course of antibiotic to me. I showed him the rashes but he was unable to link it to blood problem.
So I flied to Kuching happily with my family, my 2nd sister family and of course the antibiotic. We stayed at my eldest sister house for one night, then we all went to Holiday Inn Damai Beach Resort for 3 days and 2 nights. A very nice place, both the children and the adults enjoy very much there. Without knowing I was going to be diagnosed with Leukaemia, I was also very happy there.
Soon I finished the antibiotic but my sore throat did not seem to improve. So my eldest sister brought me to the see an ENT specialist in Kuching. He prescribed me another course of “better” antibiotic. And on the same day we went to see a Chinese Traditional Doctor, she asked me to throw away the antibiotic from the ENT and took her medicine. She guaranteed that my throat condition will be improved within 2 days. Both doctors were unable to link the rashes and the throat bleeding problem to blood problem either.
I put aside the Chinese medicine and started to take antibiotic from the ENT specialist. At that time, I felt very tired. After two days, I noticed my urine was red in colour and I suspected there must be bleeding at some part of my urinary organ. So I went to see another doctor, and he was able to identify the problem immediately. A blood test was done and on the next day, 28 November, it was confirmed that I had some form of blood disease as the platelet was extremely low and the white blood count was very high. You can see here the diagnosis is not so straight forward as it took about 2 weeks for 4 doctors to relate my problem to some form of blood disease.
My sisters went to Bintulu on 27 November to attend a wedding party of one of my relatives . So I asked the doctor to refer me to Sarawak General Hospital (SGH) for further treatment without consulting with my sisters.
On the evening of 28 November, I was admitted to SGH. Without much choice, the holiday had to be prolonged and I cancelled the flight back to KLIA on 29 November.
The diagnosis of this disease was not very straight forward. The first symptom appeared as rashes on the arms and legs early November last year. Because I just enjoyed seafood with some of our church members and our visitors from Hong Kong, I thought the rashes might be due to seafood allergy. In fact, this was my ignorant as I had no history of seafood allergy before. Furthermore the rashes were not raised and not itchy at all. It was actually due to bleeding under the skin because of low platelet, a condition called petechiae.
Other than the rashes, my health looked normal. I still went for jogging very morning and worked very hard. As my family and I prepared to go back to Sarawak for holiday, my company’s software development source code management system went completely haywire. In order to fix the problem, I worked 3 days overnight until the morning of 15 November, the day we traveled back to Bintangor.
We visited my 2nd sister in Sibu, my wife family in Sarikei, my 3rd sister (stem cell donor) which is not far from my mother house and many other relatives. Most of the time we stayed at my elder brothers house in a kampung”(Village) called Sungei Mador, the house where all my family members stayed before we have our own family. It is somewhere between Sibu and Sarikei. The children enjoyed kampung life very much. They managed to play with the dog and rabbits, chased the chickens and ducks, went for fishing, played sand, visited pepper and orange farms and experienced many other new thing.
After one week staying in the kampung, on the day we would like to fly to Kuching, I developed sore throat with blood in the phlegm. My wife and I went to see a doctor in Sarikei. This doctor speaks Foochow and called, “Ah Kiew, Ah Kiew, come.” He called me like my wife or my family member called me. After examining my throat, he said, “You have acute throat inflammation. Why you come so late?” But I did not experience any pain as when I had acute throat inflammation before. He asked me to swallow an antibiotic tablet in the clinic immediately and prescribed a 5 days course of antibiotic to me. I showed him the rashes but he was unable to link it to blood problem.
So I flied to Kuching happily with my family, my 2nd sister family and of course the antibiotic. We stayed at my eldest sister house for one night, then we all went to Holiday Inn Damai Beach Resort for 3 days and 2 nights. A very nice place, both the children and the adults enjoy very much there. Without knowing I was going to be diagnosed with Leukaemia, I was also very happy there.
Soon I finished the antibiotic but my sore throat did not seem to improve. So my eldest sister brought me to the see an ENT specialist in Kuching. He prescribed me another course of “better” antibiotic. And on the same day we went to see a Chinese Traditional Doctor, she asked me to throw away the antibiotic from the ENT and took her medicine. She guaranteed that my throat condition will be improved within 2 days. Both doctors were unable to link the rashes and the throat bleeding problem to blood problem either.
I put aside the Chinese medicine and started to take antibiotic from the ENT specialist. At that time, I felt very tired. After two days, I noticed my urine was red in colour and I suspected there must be bleeding at some part of my urinary organ. So I went to see another doctor, and he was able to identify the problem immediately. A blood test was done and on the next day, 28 November, it was confirmed that I had some form of blood disease as the platelet was extremely low and the white blood count was very high. You can see here the diagnosis is not so straight forward as it took about 2 weeks for 4 doctors to relate my problem to some form of blood disease.
My sisters went to Bintulu on 27 November to attend a wedding party of one of my relatives . So I asked the doctor to refer me to Sarawak General Hospital (SGH) for further treatment without consulting with my sisters.
On the evening of 28 November, I was admitted to SGH. Without much choice, the holiday had to be prolonged and I cancelled the flight back to KLIA on 29 November.
Friday, August 18, 2006
Day +44
I am fine today.
I live in Puchong, Selangor but I did my first chemotherapy in Kuching, Sarawak on the 30, November, 2005. Selangor is located in West Malaysia and Sarawak is located in East Malaysia. These two states are separated by South China Sea and they are more than 1000km apart. So the only practical way to travel between these two places is by plane.
You might wonder why I took all the trouble to travel over 1000km away to do my first chemotherapy. But I can tell you that I am definitely not a troublesome man like this. The reason is that my family and I were having holiday in Kuching November last year and I was diagnosed with this disease just one day before our scheduled flight back to Kuala Lumpur International Airport(KLIA). At that time, my white blood count is extremely high and the platelet is very low, the nurse hung a sign board with the word "RIB"(Rest in Bed) on my bed immediately after admission. With this "RIB" sign, I was not allowed to leave my bed. How could I fly back to KLIA without leaving the bed? The only way that I could do this was to carry the bed with me, but you know I had no strength to do this at all even before I was sick:-(
Therefore the only choice was to stay back to do the chemotherapy in Kuching.
To be continue...
See you next post.
I live in Puchong, Selangor but I did my first chemotherapy in Kuching, Sarawak on the 30, November, 2005. Selangor is located in West Malaysia and Sarawak is located in East Malaysia. These two states are separated by South China Sea and they are more than 1000km apart. So the only practical way to travel between these two places is by plane.
You might wonder why I took all the trouble to travel over 1000km away to do my first chemotherapy. But I can tell you that I am definitely not a troublesome man like this. The reason is that my family and I were having holiday in Kuching November last year and I was diagnosed with this disease just one day before our scheduled flight back to Kuala Lumpur International Airport(KLIA). At that time, my white blood count is extremely high and the platelet is very low, the nurse hung a sign board with the word "RIB"(Rest in Bed) on my bed immediately after admission. With this "RIB" sign, I was not allowed to leave my bed. How could I fly back to KLIA without leaving the bed? The only way that I could do this was to carry the bed with me, but you know I had no strength to do this at all even before I was sick:-(
Therefore the only choice was to stay back to do the chemotherapy in Kuching.
To be continue...
See you next post.
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